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Kevin Michael Vance
Writer - Portland, Oregon
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Title: ONCE UPON A TIME... IN HOLLYWOOD
Director: Quentin Tarantino
Year: 2019
Reviewed: February 12, 2020
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Birthday Cake-Second Highest Rating |
[Rating Definitions]
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Admittedly, I’ve been vacillating, struggling even, with my review of the much-loved movie, “Once Upon a Time in Hollywoodâ€. I’ve never been any kind of a fan of Quentin Tarantino’s work: some of his films I like some I don’t, some I find masturbatory and self-ingratiating. But I don’t own any of his films; nor do have any love for his films. Furthermore, I think the best Tarantino script is the movie he did NOT direct- “True Romanceâ€. So, it is with a good deal of reflection that I proffer this humble review, and state quite clearly…I wasn’t the greatest fan of “Once Upon a Time in Hollywoodâ€.
So, Quentin Tarantino likes fables. He likes fairy tales. He likes taking decidedly horrific events in history and changing them, making them Hollywood fantasies in which the good guys always win, and the bad guys always get their comeuppance. He did this with “Inglorious Bastards†and with “Django Unchainedâ€. And he does it again with the “Once Upon a Time in Hollywoodâ€. I must say, I don’t like it. I think it cheapens history. I think it cheapens the horror. I think it cheapens the memory of those who endured such things as the Holocaust and the Manson Murders. It’s false. Not just that, but it feels false, it feels untrue. It’s a lie. And I feel like Tarantino is actively mocking history. Taking such a tragic, brutal, and sickening event as the murder of Shannon Tate and her unborn child and making it this lively action-fest more reminiscent of an 1980’s Schwarzenegger flick is quite simply… sick. And on a personal note, I just find it to be lazy writing. Anyone can take a horrible moment in history switch it around and make it more palatable. But I get the feeling that Tarantino has never asked himself this question… more palatable for whom? More palatable for the millions of human beings viciously and systematically murdered during the Holocaust, or…I don’t really know… maybe more palatable for those that have never, nor will ever, experience genocide in their lifetime? Maybe? You see, I just don’t get it. Why sugarcoat history? Why change it to fit what?... your own megalomaniacal sensibilities? I also do NOT appreciate, nor respect, his depiction of Bruce Lee. Bruce Lee was a great man, far greater than Quentin Tarantino could ever dream of being. And to demean his memory, to put on screen a persona that is simply represented as an arrogant buffoon is so impertinent I can barely wrap my brain around it.
As with all of Tarantino’s films, there are some great scenes: every scene containing Christoph Waltz in “Inglorious Bastards†is fantastic, the scene at Suicide Ranch in “Once Upon a Time in Hollywood†is also extremely good. But as with many of Tarantino’s film as a whole, I find it incredibly lacking, in both depth and sensibility.
I don’t think “Once Upon a Time in Hollywood†is that good. Therefore, I give it a BIRTHDAY CAKE review.
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